I am trying to set up a single library on Google Drive to share among my devices. I began with my Calibre library on my Windows 7 laptop, and moved the library to my Google Drive. I then installed Calibre on my Windows 7 desktop, and changed the default library location to use the existing library on the Google Drive. I was immediately able to view the library structure and all my titles on the desktop, but when I tried to open books, I was informed that no available formats of the titles existed.

The only way I can see to get the new library to see the books is to import them, but then I get two copies of the books in the database. Further, the imported copy of the book doesn't inherit the metadata of the old one, so I have to merge the metadata and then check and edit it afterwards. A lot of work. Has anyone run into this problem? Is there something special I have to do to get two installations to use the same database?

Oh, since someone is likely to ask, I am not running the programs on the two machines at the same time. I only had one computer turned on at a time when I first ran into this, so that is not the problem.

I am trying to set up a single library on Google Drive to share among my devices. I began with my Calibre library on my Windows 7 laptop, and moved the library to my Google Drive. I then installed Calibre on my Windows 7 desktop, and changed the default library location to use the existing library on the Google Drive. I was immediately able to view the library structure and all my titles on the desktop, but when I tried to open books, I was informed that no available formats of the titles existed.

The only way I can see to get the new library to see the books is to import them, but then I get two copies of the books in the database. Further, the imported copy of the book doesn't inherit the metadata of the old one, so I have to merge the metadata and then check and edit it afterwards. A lot of work. Has anyone run into this problem? Is there something special I have to do to get two installations to use the same database?

Oh, since someone is likely to ask, I am not running the programs on the two machines at the same time. I only had one computer turned on at a time when I first ran into this, so that is not the problem.

Yes to Dropbox, I've had my library in Dropbox for multiple years. I believe Skydrive should also work. Google drive is the only one reported as screwing with any file that has a (xx) in the file name.